Blog Post

Exploring Key Elements of Spotify’s Agile Scaling Model

1. Squads

Similar to scrum teams, Spotify has squads. In an organisation, there can be multiple squads consisting of 6-12 people each dedicated to work on one feature area. A squad is autonomous, self-organizing and self-managing. Each squad has a mission to accomplish and is free to choose an agile methodology. Squads may follow KANBAN, scrum sprints, xp, or a mix of these to carry out their duties. In order to release early and often, squads apply the Most Viable Product (MVP) technique.

Squads have an Agile Coach that help improve their way of working. There is a Product Owner who defines the vision of the feature area. The agile coach conducts retrospectives while sprint planning meetings are kept optional. Each squad has direct contact with stakeholders.

Dev and ops work in such a way that the operations do not interfere with the work of the developers. Rather the operations pave the way for the developers to release the work for themselves. This is done by creating an environment such as building an infrastructure and the support to let the developers launch their work. Face to face communication is encouraged over documentation. Operations is a separate squad to help other dev squads.

2. Tribes

Multiple squads that work on the related feature area makes a tribe. A tribe may consist of 40-150 people but ideally, a tribe should have max. 100 individuals. A tribe has a tribe lead responsible for creating a productive and an innovative environment for the squads. The tribe lead can be part of a squad as well.

3. Chapter

At the horizontal level of the functional organization, there are chapters which are also known as the specialists. A chapter consists of individuals from different squads to be grouped into one and formed within a tribe. A chapter lead is also a line manager of the chapter members and support them in their personal growth and specific challenges.

4. Guild

An informal group constituted of people from different tribes, who have a common interest, form a guild. A person from any squad, chapter or tribe can be a part of a guild.

The purpose of having a chapter and a guild are the same; ensure transparency by solving problems and keeping the teams aligned and focused. For example, there is a tester from squad A who is struggling with a problem. There is another tester in squad B who has easily solved the same problem. If both are in the same chapter, they can share their problem and find a solution.

If they are in different chapters, then they would have a guild of testers where they can share their knowledge and help each other out.

The chapter lead has weekly meetings in which all the chapter members present upcoming issues and discuss a solution. Guild workshops like hackathon have been a famous activity for guild members.

5. Trio

A trio is formed when for every tribe there is a design, product area and a tribe lead.

6. Alliance

A combination of three trios makes an alliance. It is led by a product, design and a tribe lead.

7. Chief Architect

Lastly, a crucial member of organisation is the chief architect who defines architectural vision, guides in designs and deals with the system architecture dependency issues. To keep track of architecture issues, each system has a system owner who handles the dependencies of the architecture and keeps check of the frequent release delivery of each system. To mitigate any risks with the architecture, a system owner’s responsibilities are divided into dev and ops. These partial responsibilities can be handled by any member of a squad.

Benefits of the Spotify Engineering Method

The foundation of the Spotify Tribe is autonomy and trust. When there is trust, then there is ownership and accountability of the work done. Trust helps to create an environment where failure is taken as an opportunity to learn, innovate and change accordingly. This also uplifts individual morale and growth. This results in having the following benefits: